Stroke of the Brush
by JCOdyssey
Summary: With the weight of a traditional gift-giving festival hanging over her, Mitama fights off insomnia and writer's block.


Mitama heard the wind pounding against the door. It blew a chill into the house and across the room, but she paid the cold no mind. There was enough to worry about right in front of her. From the scattered piles of paper, she picked up a new sheet, dabbed her brush in ink, and made a stroke. She thought the words would come naturally, but her hand simply moved along until a black line strode across the paper. Frustrated, she crumpled it up and tossed it over into the open flame. As she watched it burn to black flakes, she thought back to what her mother had told her the other day.

* * *

" _What do you mean, a gift-giving festival?"_

 _Corrin smiled at Mitama, clearly excited by what she wanted to say._

" _Oh, Mitama, dear, it sounds wonderful! Sakura was just telling me about it. Every winter in Hoshido, families and friends gather together to exchange gifts with each other._

 _Her mother still wasn't making any sense. "But why? It would be so much simpler to spend our time at home instead."_

" _They say that it's done to celebrate a victory of Hoshido over Nohr that happened centuries ago. Apparently, the Hoshidans didn't fight the battle. They brought the starving Nohrian soldiers food to eat and blankets to wrap themselves in instead, and for that night, the armies were at peace with each other!" Corrin crossed her arms and her face turned dark. She was silent for a minute, staring at the ground. "Lord knows we could use something like that right now."_

 _Mitama, not wanting to stress her mother out anymore, decided to stop prodding her. "Then what do you plan to give?"_

 _Corrin perked up. "Oh, I'll be making necklaces for everyone! I've been learning from Orochi lately, and I'd say I'm pretty good at it. Don't tell your anyone else, though. I want them to be a surprise."_

 _Mitama nodded. "What wonderful gifts / Little pieces of your love / Sure to bring much cheer."_

" _And what about you, dear? Any gifts that you want to give? Any special someone that you want to give one to?_

 _Mitama's face went bright red. "No..not particularly. And, anyways, I have no gifts to offer. My money is spent / My talents are unrefined / What could I offer?"_

" _Honey, listen to yourself! Of course you have talents to use!"_

" _I do?"_

" _Yes, you can give people your poems! I know you have a way with words, so why not give them out to the ones who you love? I'm sure that everyone would cherish a piece from you, no matter how small."_

 _Mitama pondered her mother's proposition. "My words wish to flow / Ready to burst on the page / Messages of joy."_

 _Corrin hugged her daughter close. "See? You're working already! I know you can do this, dear. Let your feelings run wild."_

* * *

"Let your feelings run wild," Mitama muttered to herself.

It didn't seem like they were very active right now. She had spent hours going through sheet after sheet, but nothing had come to her so far. Her mind was as blank as the paper that she continued to stare at.

She fiddled with her brush in her hand. Little drops of ink splattered on the desk. She pressed it against her head, but still, nothing would come out. There were no thoughts to let spill, no waves of poetry to unleash on to the canvas. It annoyed her. She didn't want to force the words out, they should have been coming naturally. But the growing stack of ashes in the fire was proof that they wouldn't arrive any time soon.

The wind struck at the walls again. This time it felt lighter, but Mitama saw that it carried more snow into the house. Angry that nature was doing everything it could to make her dilemma more frustrating, Mitama stormed over to the door and went to lock it up tight. But when she opened it up to brush the snow out, the outside caught her by surprise.

Light illuminated the terrace, catching every tiny flake of snow in a vast swath of dazzling white. The night sky was missing its stars, but they were replaced by dancing snowflakes that shone brilliantly in the light. Mitama gazed at the sky like she had done as a child, once held in the arms of her mother and father. Absorbed in the beauty of the snow, she stepped outside to admire it, oblivious to the cold and growing wind.

One single snowflake caught her attention, and she watched as it twirled around in the air before finally settling in the ground with a small _poof._ She knelt down to look at where it had landed. The white surface jumped out at her, a reminder of the stacks of blank paper waiting back inside. It gave her an idea.

Softly, she took the back of her brush and traced out a single word in the snow.

"Love."

It was short, but it was a start. And it made her smile. She walked around and wrote another word.

"Warmth."

One by one, they began to come out of her. Soon, words, sentences, and poems were forming on the ground by her hand. As the snow continued to fall, she stopped writing and looked back up to the sky. The white flurry of light looked like the largest canvas she had ever seen.

She jumped up, running around with her brush to the sky. She wrote out her poems in the sky, each one coming and disappearing in a flash. When the snow picked up, she ran even faster, taking in the wonder of the night around her. When she had covered the sky with all the words that would come out, she stood and smiled at the wintery world before her. But her brush did not want to stop. She could feel it twitching, ready to take to the paper.

Mitama breathed in. She knew that she was, too.

* * *

In the early hours of the morning, Azama made his way downstairs to watch the sunrise over the snowy landscape. Creeping along the floorboards so as to not wake anyone up, he turned into the writing room and saw Mitama at her desk, snoring away. He nudged her.

"Mitama. Mitama, my daughter, wake up! Come and rise so that we may start another day on this thankless earth."

But even he couldn't get her to wake up today. She was passed out cold-and freezing to the touch. The front door was open behind her, snow piled up in front of it.

"Honey, are you getting up early again?" Corrin stumbled in, wrapped in their blanket. She shivered. "If you're going to go out, could you at least shut the door? I think my feet are turning blue."

"Well, my love, I don't think you can blame me. Our fool of a daughter left the door open all night and fell asleep right here. I can't believe-"

"Just shut the door…" Still groggy, Corrin made her way to the door and closed it tight. Some warmth began to return to the room. "What was she doing down here, anyways?"

Azama peered over his daughter's shoulder. For a second, he was confused by what he saw, but soon smiled at what she had done. "Corrin, love, come over and see what our little fool has done."

Corrin walked around and looked at the work in front of Mitama. It was poems, a dozen or so of them, each addressed to a different person. She saw her, Azama, Kanna, Sakura, Ryoma, Takumi, Hinoka, Caeldori, Asugi, Shigure… Each one was heartfelt, and crafted with each word striking a cord to her heart. Her and Azama sifted through the scattered papers, and one caught Corrin's eye.

It was addressed to Mikoto.

Corrin picked it up to read, Azama looking over her. "She never even met my mother…"

 _Guardian mother_

 _Light the sky with brilliance_

 _To bring us your peace_

As she read it aloud, Corrin began to choke up. When she was finished, tears were in her eyes, and Azama was holding her tight. Beneath him, he could feel Mitama quivering as well.

"Hey," he whispered, "I think it's time that we get you two ladies back to bed."

Corrin nodded. She took off the blanket and wrapped Mitama in it. The girl's shivering stopped, and she cozied up to the fuzzy home in her sleep. Rubbing her eyes, Corrin made her way back upstairs. Azama picked his daughter up and carried her back to her room. A warm, untouched bed was waiting for her. He tucked her into it and gave her a kiss on the forehead. "Just this once, daughter, I'll let you sleep as much as you want."

Mitama smiled and continued to drift into her snowy dreams.


End file.
